Ministers have been told to align school business leaders’ pay with that of other leaders as analysis shows their salaries have stagnated.
School business managers play a key role in managing school finances, but are often paid on the support staff pay scale, set by the National Joint Council for Local Government Services (NJC).
In their submissions to the teacher review body, the NAHT and ASCL unions called for the government to consider aligning school business leader (SBLs) pay with a revised school leadership pay structure.
SBLs “play a critical role in the strategic and operational success of schools and trusts”, and “strategic decision-making”, NAHT said.
Yet “too few … are remunerated on a salary that aligns with the senior responsibilities they exercise”, which creates “disparities in their recognition, progression and retention”.
Better definition
A union survey of 161 respondents suggested four in five were paid on the NJC scale, with just 5 per cent on the leadership pay spine.
Rachel Younger, chair of NAHT’s SBL sector council, said: “If you’re a leader, you’re a leader … People should be paid commensurate with the job that they’re doing, with the level of complexity and accountability of those roles.”
Salaries vary with councils using different pay scales, and a lack of clarity over different role types – such as school business managers and chief financial officers – also leads to variability, experts added.
Stephen Morales, chief executive of the Institute of School Business Leadership (ISBL), added: “An SBM can earn from £25,000, up to in excess of £150,000.
“I think we need a much more precise definition of what we mean by an SBL or school business professional. The catch-all descriptor is not telling us very much.”
Andrea Howard, school business leader at Mill Ford School in Plymouth, said: “I’ve never met two school business leaders who have the same job.
“Some people are called an office manager, but they’re doing the school business management role, because the office manager’s salary is cheaper. Some people are school business managers [but] don’t sit on SLT. There’s so much variation.”
She said any SBL pay framework must take “experience, scope of work, qualifications” into account.
Falling business leader pay
Meanwhile analysis of job adverts by SchoolDash shows school business leader pay has fallen in real terms. Advertised salaries have risen by just two per cent since 2020, while inflation has averaged about four per cent in that time.
The average school business leader salary this year was £50,411, SchoolDash found, marginally higher than last year’s £49,278 and the 2023 average of £49,640.
For comparison, the median teacher pay in 2024 was £49,084 – a 5.5 per cent rise from the previous year alone.
Younger said lack of parity with other leaders has long been “a bone of contention” for school business professionals, but has “definitely got worse” in recent years, with flat-rate awards eroding salaries. Meanwhile they are working under more pressure than ever “trying to stretch the budget to go further”.
Chevon Ancora, of Branfil Primary School in London, said: “The job is ever-evolving. We’re being required to be professionals in all these different spheres.” Yet some SBLs “are paid less than a teacher with no leadership responsibilities”.
Sally Thomson, of St Edward’s C of E Primary School in Romford, said business leaders “don’t seem to be getting any recognition from the government as being actual school leaders.”
She said the salary uplift from flat-rate pay rises has been “really low”. “I think [school business leaders] should be recognised on existing leadership pay scales.”
‘Angry and frustrated’
Younger said colleagues “are quite angry in a lot of cases, and frustrated, and we are seeing a lot of people leaving the profession early. Pay is part of recognition, but it’s a really big part of recognition.”
An NAHT survey this month found 85 per cent of business professionals did not feel their salary fairly reflects their responsibilities.
Only 28 per cent would now recommend leadership roles – a drop from 43 per cent in 2021.
Of 770 school business professionals recently surveyed by the Department for Education, six per cent said they wanted to quit “as soon as possible”, and 10 per cent within the year. Although the majority (59 per cent) said they wanted to stay for at least three years.
Joe Demetriou, a former SBM, said business leaders have “significant school-wide responsibilities that often demand long hours and high commitment”, but often “face contract terms that do not reflect these demands”.
In some cases, roles “are not advertised at the top of the support staff pay grade”.
Term-time only rise
SchoolDash analysis found a sharp rise in term-time-only (TTO) adverts this year. After accounting for 3.8 per cent of SBM roles advertised in 2022, this dropped to zero in 2023, before jumping to 6.8 per cent in 2024.
Although the sample sizes “are relatively small”, the shift is differences “statistically significant”, said SchoolDash.
Younger said she felt the increase is likely “around cost-cutting”.
Justine Berkeley, managing director of SBM Services, which supports business staff, said more schools and trusts must “maintain the capacity and capability needed to manage complex business operations effectively throughout the whole year”.
“Increasingly, we are working with SBMs who are struggling to meet the full breadth of the role because sufficient time is simply not allocated to carry out all of the responsibilities expected of them,” she said.
ISBL has created its own school business professional pay framework, which uses head teacher pay scales as a baseline to calculate recommended pay, applying weighting to variables.
Demetriou added: “Proper remuneration and contract terms are essential to attract and retain skilled professionals to fulfil these vital responsibilities.”
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